What is the mindset and why is it important?
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The mindset is a way of thinking, and it is important because it impacts your behavior and decisions you make. In the book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, author Carol Dweck researched why mindset is important and how it impacts success. Carol Dweck talks about two different mindsets: the fixed mindset and the growth mindset. She observed that successful people like basketball player Michale Jordan and witter J. K. Rowling, had one thing in common, and it was the growth mindset, while less successful people had the fixed mindset. So what is the difference between the fixed mindset and the growth mindset?
The fixed mindset vs the growth mindset
The fixed mindset is the killer of the success. To have fixed mindset means not taking responsibility, not improving and avoiding doing risky tasks essential to your success in order to avoid failure and not look dumb in front of other people. For a person with the fixed mindset talent and skill are fixed, so hard work and practice are useless because they think they will never be equally good or better than a talented and skilled person. If they receive some kind of feedback on their performance from someone, they will become offended and resent the person even if that feedback might help them fix the issue they are having. A negative mindset like this is common and it is enforced in our heads by parents, peers, society, and media.
The growth mindset is the root of the success. People with the growth mindset are responsible, they will always strive to learn and improve, and they will risk frequently to become more successful. In case of failure, they will take a lesson from it and try not to repeat it. The growth mindset acknowledges talent, but also understand that talent is not enough to be successful. They think that constant improvement, learning, practicing and hard work is what makes someone successful, and talent is there to give a quick boost and nothing more. For people with a growth mindset, criticism and advice are there to help them out and they will be less likely to be offended by it even if it was meant to hurt them. The growth mindset is rare and you will rarely find the person that possess this kind of mindset.
Is it possible to change your mindset?
It is easy to get stuck in the fixed mindset, but it is not impossible to change it because your mindset is going through constant change. By recognizing a negative way of thinking and replacing them with a positive way of thinking will help you change your mindset and increase your chances of becoming more successful. After reading the book, I created the 4-step process that helped me to change my mindset from the fixed mindset to the growth mindset, so I want to share in case you might find it useful.
The 4-step process for changing your mindset:
1) Become aware of the voice of fixed mindset...
When you approach a challenge you might be intimidated and the inner voice will start telling you: “You are not talented or skilled to do this. What if you fail? You will be a failure and people will make fun of you, so it is better not to try to protect yourself from embarrassment.”
If someone starts to criticize you, the voice might start saying:
“It’s not my fault. It was something or someone else’s fault.”
When a person is giving you constructive feedback the voice might interpret it as:
“I thought you were capable but now I see you’re not and I’m really disappointed in you.”
After recognizing the voice of the fixed mindset you must...
2) Understand that you have a choice...
You need to understand that it is your choice how you are going to interpret world and events around you. Interpretation of challenges, criticism, and feedback is your choice. You can interpret them with the fixed mindset voice, in the way that you lack talent or skill and that criticism and feedback are bad and meant to offend you. Or you can interpret them with the growth mindset voice, in the way that you need to develop skill, practice, expand your abilities and take criticism and feedback as a chance to fix flaws that you don’t notice yourself. It is up to you, so when you notice the voice of the fixed mindset, start to...
3) Counter it with the voice of growth mindset...
When you face a challenge and voice says: "What if you fail?"
Then counter it with: “You will never be successful if you are constantly afraid of failure, just do it and if you fail, take it as a lesson and don’t repeat it again.”
If you get criticism and voice says: "It’s not my fault."
Counter it with: "If you don't take responsibility for it, you will not be able to fix the problem."
If you get constructive feedback: “I thought you were capable but now I see you’re not and I’m really disappointed in you.”
Counter: "Take feedback, and work on it. You will become a better person and then you will be glad that you got useful feedback."
Then start...
4) Taking action immediately with the voice of growth mindset...
When you counter the fixed mindset with the growth mindset, it is important for you to take the growth mindset action. As time passes and you take action, the voice of fixed mindset will become quieter and the voice of growth mindset will become louder, so it will be easier for you to act on the voice of the growth mindset. You will start learning and improving faster, take criticism and feedback as a good thing, and this will eventually make you more successful. So try practicing the 4-step process and see what happens.
So what do you think about the fixed mindset and the growth mindset? Is having the growth mindset important to you? Comment your answers below and follow me because you are beautiful.